iii. The Black Comet Cometh
For now though, both Maria and Gerald had other things to think about. Gerry and his wife were coming up on the next shuttle, and Ivan was coming as well, "with a fabulous surprise, I hope". Once again Gerald was hovering around the docking bay; vaguely amazed at the expansion of the area since he'd been there last. He had made a point of walking the halls and corridors of the newly extended colony, but hadn't been in this area since the public expansion. He was hovering rather than pacing because in spite of the increased size, there were a fair number of other people also awaiting the shuttle's arrival. Maria had no such constraints and her small form darted and wove through the crowd with an ease that her grandfather could only admire. All at once she stopped short and came sliding back through the crowd to clutch his hand. "They're here Grandfather! They really came!"
"Did you think they would change their minds, my dear?" Gerald grinned down at her even as he saw the lights at the far end of the bay start to flash. He couldn't hear anything himself, but Maria's younger ears probably could hear the vessel as it moved through the ARK's "fizz field". That one was not one of his inventions, although it was powered by the energy fluid near the ARK and chaos drives on the perimeter. It kept enough air close in that humans could travel with minimal protection from cold and decompression along the surface of the ARK; breathing masks, although strongly recommended, were not absolutely necessary. Further out from the colony asteroid it was not dense enough to breathe (although the designer felt that dokans would be able to breathe out there, as they absorbed and used oxygen more efficiently than humans) but the main purpose was to provide radiation shielding and a safety net for workers in case of accidents - they couldn't live indefinitely out in the fizz field, but between the Ark and the perimeter boundaries it held enough air to prevent immediate decompression and asphyxiation, and also enough heat to prevent them being flash frozen in case of a suit tear. In other words, if there was an accident, there was now a much better chance of rescue, which improved morale immensely. A variation of the field was now set across the mouth of the shuttle bay, permitting the shuttles to pass in and out while keeping most of the air in - much more efficient than the old bay doors which had wasted colossal amounts of air. The old doors were now only closed for maintenance or if there was a meteor threat. A new transport system had been set up that actually passed through a series of bays and out into space between them, making use of the field in the same manner, although double airlock doors were installed in case of emergency. Powered by the same "rail" of channeled energy fluid that they ran along, a series of monorail platforms hauled material from the shuttle bays to other areas without impeding traffic in the corridors.
But now the shuttle was settling onto its wheels and the crowd was pressing forward against the rails that kept them back from the landing area. Gerald allowed Maria to drag him forward to the fence but caught her around the waist as she clambered up onto it. "Grandfather! I wasn't going over it!" He ignored her indignant comment and retained his hold. After an eternal pause, the door opened and the ramp extended and people began to disembark. Maria was now bouncing on the rail hard enough that one foot slipped and she would have fallen if Gerald hadn't been already holding on to her. She didn't even notice, automatically bracing the foot back on the rail as she began waving both arms at her parents as they came down the ramp.
Once the passengers got to the fence the gate was opened. By the time the swirl of new arrivals and resident friends had sorted itself out, Gerald and Maria had been joined not only by Maria's parents but by Ivan as well, who dropped an odd-shaped bundle at his feet long enough to hug his father. Gerald gave the bundle a curious look, wondering if it was the promised surprise.
"That's Maria's surprise, Dad," laughed Ivan catching the glance. "This,"he reached back and pulled forward a red-haired young woman, "is your surprise. I think you may have heard me mention Katherine once or twice." The tall young man smirked as he said that, knowing full well that his letters to Gerald had spoken of little else BUT Katherine McConnell for the last several months. "But I don't believe I mentioned that she'd agreed to marry me." He grinned broadly as Gerald first hugged him again, then hugged the young woman and kissed her cheek.
"She agreed to marry you?" exclaimed Gerry in exaggerated shock. "What did you do to the poor girl - threaten to push her off a roof if she didn't agree?" However his greeting to Katherine was friendly enough. As Angela greeted Katherine he turned back to Gerald. "But we brought you a surprise as well, Dad." He gestured grandly towards the crowd of new arrivals. A sudden swirl of motion and startled exclamations drew Gerald's attention and he managed to not quite gape as he saw Rafe and Todd emerge from the crowd of humans.
"Happy birthday!" announced the sable hedgehog. He hesitated a moment, then added "Sorry - Jenny gave me a kiss to give you, but you'll just have to take my word for it. Or maybe..." He looked at Maria who had wriggled away from her parents to gaze at the dokan. She'd heard all about Rafe and the others from Gerald - some of her favorite stories were about his exploring the Echidnan temples - but she had never actually met any dokan. "You must be Maria." At her solemn nod, Rafe continued, "Will you give something to your grandfather for me?" Receiving a second nod he rose on tiptoe and kissed her cheek, eliciting a giggle. "My wife sent that to him, but I can't quite deliver it myself, you see." With another giggle Maria skipped over to Gerald and pulled him down to kiss his cheek. Then she turned back to the dokan and shed both solemnity and speechlessness, chattering questions like a magpie. As the rest of the crowd seemed to be ready to stare at the fox and hedgehog all day, Gerald decided to set an example by waving his family and friends towards the door. He had set up a new Heal Unit server in the main room of the younger Robotniks' quarters, and Maria had had great fun setting up her family's new "house"; she'd be staying with them now unless she got sick again. Gerald had also snagged as-yet-unoccupied quarters two doors down for the duration of Ivan's visit; fortunately it was also a family unit, as he had not anticipated Katherine's visit. He had no idea if they wanted separate rooms or would share one, but the extra was there if they wanted it. As for the dokan... he settled them into his own wing, one in Maria's former room and one in the guest room.
Maria was thrilled to be back with her parents and she got on well with the dokan - "like a house afire" was one phrase Gerry heard when Maria was returned, filthy but completely unrepentant from an area she shouldn't have been in to start with; she had gone exploring with Todd and they'd decided to see what lay past the barricades. Part of what lay past the barricades was a not-yet-shored wall of loose rubble, which had come down around the pair when she failed to steer her skates quite where she had intended to go.
"But Daddy, I needed a long hallway to try out Uncle Ivan's gift, and like Uncle Todd said, there weren't any signs saying Keep Out, " Todd, who along with Rafe had been declared an honorary uncle, made a brief attempt to back her up, then caught Gerry's look and retreated, trying to brush the grit out of his fur. Gerry confiscated Maria's new hoverskates, sent her on to her room and called Gerald to ask him to ask Todd to please NOT encourage his daughter to get into trouble. Not that he was really mad. When he and Angela had sent Maria up to the ARK they had been hoping against hope for just a temporary reprieve - seeing his daughter essentially normal was beyond anything they had hoped for, and Maria happy and getting into mischief was simply a miracle. He was also enjoying the chance to spend time with Ivan and his fiancée, not to mention seeing his father happy again. He and Ivan had both been worried after their mother died, but Maria seemed to have revived her grandfather. She had that effect on a lot of people, he'd noticed. She seemed to know absolutely everyone on the ARK, and vice versa - although as she had been until recently the only child in the base, the latter was perhaps not too surprising. The dokan seemed to have fallen under her spell as well, which amused him. He found the nonhumans a bit strange, but he rather liked them. The family had made one trip down south before Mary had died and he remembered Jenny's kindness and Rafe's casual insolence with fondness; he'd even been taken up in the Flying Fox by Todd. He hadn't been back since, but he and Angela corresponded with a couple of astronomers on the southern continent. Ivan for some reason had always been more wary of the dokan, but he covered it well and Katherine, who had not met any until they all arrived at the ARK, seemed to be as fascinated by them as Maria So altogether it was a very cheerful group that had gathered for Gerald's 60th birthday. Katherine, Ivan, and the dokan stayed for two weeks, and Gerald took the longest vacation he'd had since arriving on the ARK.
The day after the actual party, Ivan, Katherine, and the dokan left for Earth; Gerald returned to work on Project: Shadow; and Maria got to start actual school, as there were now nearly two dozen children on the ARK. She'd liked being tutored by her grandfather, but she couldn't remember ever having friends her own age. She made friends with them, and they all got along well, but somehow she ended up outside the cliques that quickly formed. One group of girls who were at least several years older than she giggled over photos of movie stars and singers, and tried on each other's makeup trying to look grown up. The other group made up of girls Maria's age or a bit younger, traded fashions for their dolls and just generally were interested in things she wasn't. So she spent a lot of her time after school in the lab with Gerald, or sometimes in her old room with Silver. Her mother actually found the grey hooded rat a rather appealing creature, but her father had put his foot down and refused to let her bring Silver into their quarters. The other girls had decided it was fashionable to pretend terror when they saw him, silly things. Only Dorothy, a year older than Maria, actually bothered to get to know him; and even Dorothy would squeal if any of the other girls were around. The boys were fascinated with the rat when she took him in to show at school, but they were mostly too old to bother with girls, or at least girls her age. The exception was a boy a few years younger than she, with odd, mismatched eyes. He was an only child and his parents seemed to be often too busy to spend much time with him, so Maria decided he needed a big sister and put herself in that role. He tended to be rather a brat at times, but he did like Silver, and was interested in the other animals in the labs. Gerald conceived a liking for the boy himself, although the lad had a distressing tendency to jump to a conclusion and cling to it despite evidence to the contrary.
Maria's parents had officially applied to come up to Space Colony ARK because as astronomers they could benefit from the much clearer view that space telescopes had over ground-based ones. Angela Robotnik was primarily researching the historical formation of the solar system, while Gerald Robotnik Jr. was more interested in tracking near-Earth bodies, mainly asteroids - which was how his father had been able to so-conveniently suggest the particular one to build the ARK into - but also comets that might pass through or near Earth's orbit. At the moment one of those comets was again nearing the planet. It had various names in various languages, but after the first view of it through a telescope it had been officially named the Black Comet. Most comets were fairly light-colored "dirty snowballs", but the nucleus of this one was black, enough so that the earliest studies were unable to determine a size for it. Although the tail was clearly visible, it wasn't until astronomers had applied other means than visible light telescopy that anyone had been able to determine its size. Infrared telescopes had also revealed that the nucleus was unusually warm. And there were other oddities about it as well, Gerald learned.
He was having dinner with the family and conversation had turned to the upcoming expedition that was being organized to go visit the Black Comet.
"So it's dark colored and apparently too warm?" was Gerald's question as he accepted a slice of (slightly lopsided) cake that Maria had made "almost by herself".
"That's only the beginning, Dad. I dug through about three thousand years of astronomical records, right back to the Babylonians, and it's really weird. You know that most comets have a pretty regular cycle of appearance when their orbits bring them back past the planet. Well this one...varies." Gerry tasted his dessert, grinned at his daughter, who was watching anxiously, and continued. "For starters, it just sort of - appeared. About twenty-three hundred years ago, the first records turn up. Before that, nothing. It's not uncommon of course to have gaps in the records, but even during settled periods when even some remarkably faint "bearded stars" or "divine fires" were recorded, they can all be identified as other comets, with not a one missing, EXCEPT the Black Comet.
"Also it's got a "usual" period of 53 years, but sometimes it seems to have turned up late - and by "late" I mean a decade or even two - and in a few cases never showed at all. And those absences were in times of good record-keeping. Even stranger was the time it turned up thirty years early. It's not like a comet can just decide to take a shortcut!"
"Hmmm," was Gerald's response. "And I assume there weren't any planetary conjunctions that might have shifted the orbit to account for the delayed returns?"
"Nothing. I checked it six ways from Sunday, Dad. It's almost like the thing's traveling under its own power sometimes."
That got Maria's attention. "Maybe it's really a spaceship Daddy, and its all full of little purple aliens that want to eat our brains!"
"Maria!" Angela looked at her daughter in shock. "Where did you get an idea like that?"
"Mokie was telling me about this movie he saw." Maria scraped the last bit of icing off her plate, totally unconcerned. "May I have another piece cake, Mommy?"
"Mokie? Who's that?" Angela picked up her daughter's plate and placed a thin slice of cake on it.
"Thank you, Mommy. He's the boy with the funny eyes, like in Summer Pony where the horse had one blue eye and one brown and they called it Mokie. So I call him Mokie when he's being a pest."
"He's younger than you are. His parents let him watch movies like that?"
Maria frowned. "I don't think they really care what he watches. Sometimes," she added thoughtfully, "I don't think they really like him much. So that's why I 'dopted him. 'Sides he likes Silver."
There was a pause in the conversation at that point, and the adults didn't return to the subject of the comet until Maria had been tucked into bed. Gerald brought the conversation back to the planned trip. Gerry explained, " Basically we've got two goals: one, to get out there and look at a comet in its dormant state, before it's close enough to the sun to start ejecting dust and gas; two, we want to leave a probe on the surface to send back data on what happens as the comet gets close enough to develop its tail. We'll probably lose the probe before the comet hits perihelion, but if we're really lucky it'll last and we can keep getting readings as the comet moves away again.
"It's still four years out at this point, so it should be solid enough to land on and get some cores and surface samples. Angie, of course, is hoping that we can learn some details on how the thing was formed that might shed some light on the history of the solar system in general." He ran through a list of the rest of the crew - two other astronomers and the actual shuttle pilots, then concluded, "We were hoping we might be able to talk you into looking after Maria while we're gone?" His expression suggested it was a foregone conclusion, as indeed it was. Which was why barely six months after moving into her "house" in the colony section of the ARK, Gerry and Angela were helping Maria move some of her things back to her old room. And two days after that Gerald and Maria were standing in the dock again, waving the shuttle goodbye. Maria had said a cheerful goodbye to her parents - they'd be gone a month or so, but she'd get to look after Grandfather again, as well as Silver and Mokie.
Then about two weeks after the shuttle left for the Black Comet, Maria was called out of class and did not return. As soon as school let out Mokie ran through the corridors to her room, only to find the whole wing closed. A sign on the door to Gerald and Maria's quarters bore the alarming words "While we appreciate your sympathy, we wish privacy at the current time." He knocked on the door anyway, but had to leave Maria's homework on the floor by the door, where several envelopes and a few flowers had already been placed. When he got back to his family's empty quarters, he turned on the colony news and learned that the shuttle that had been sent out to investigate the Black Comet had unexpectedly exploded. All aboard were believed to be dead.
A/N: Thanks for the reviews, they are much appreciated. The story currently runs through part 7iii, so there's plenty more ready to post. It will probably go to 9 chapters but that may change as I go. I plan to keep posting twice a week until I catch up to where I am in my writing or reach the end.